Skip to content

Follow your curiosity

What’s in your jar?

Grow it.Pickle it.Eat it.
Recipes

Eat it. · PickleRadio

Pickle tuna salad with celery and lemon

A tuna sandwich filling with properly drained fish, diced pickles and celery, held together with lemon mayonnaise.

By PickleRadio editorialUpdated
Jump to recipe
Flaked tuna with celery, pickles and parsley.
In this guide5 sections

Drain the tuna before reaching for mayonnaise

A watery tin makes a watery sandwich. Drain the tuna thoroughly, then break it into flakes with a fork before you decide how much dressing it needs. This recipe keeps enough mayonnaise to bind the fish while leaving the celery and pickle pieces distinct.

Yield: 3 generous sandwich-filling servings. Prep time: 15 minutes. Cook time: 0 minutes. Choose canned tuna in spring water and weigh it after draining; the weight printed prominently on the tin may include its liquid. This is a recipe for ready-cooked canned tuna, not a way to prepare raw fish.

Ingredients

  • 220 g (8 oz) drained canned tuna in spring water
  • 80 g (3 oz) drained dill pickles
  • 1 celery stalk, about 50 g
  • 60 g (2 oz) shop-bought mayonnaise
  • 10 ml (2 teaspoons) lemon juice
  • 5 g (1 teaspoon) Dijon mustard
  • 5 g fresh parsley, chopped
  • ¼ teaspoon ground black pepper

Method

  1. Drain the canned tuna in a sieve, pressing lightly with a fork to release trapped water. Transfer to a mixing bowl and separate the larger flakes. Stop before it becomes a completely shredded paste.
    Canned tuna in spring water draining in a fine stainless steel sieve over a cream bowl on a pale oak counter.
    Press lightly to release trapped water without shredding every tuna flake.
  2. Dice the pickles finely and blot them dry. Wash the celery and parsley, dry them, then cut the celery into very small cubes and chop the parsley. Remove any tough celery strings you notice.
    Pale oak cutting board with a little finely diced celery, tiny dill-pickle cubes on a white towel and chopped flat-leaf parsley.
    Finely dice the celery and pickles so their crunch spreads through the filling.
  3. In a separate small bowl, stir the mayonnaise, lemon juice, mustard and black pepper until smooth. Making the dressing separately avoids having to beat the tuna repeatedly to distribute mustard.
  4. Add the dressing to the tuna and fold with a fork. Stir in the pickles, celery and parsley, then check that the mixture holds together when gathered against the side of the bowl.
    Flaked tuna, diced pickles, celery and parsley being folded through mayonnaise dressing.
    Fold the dressing through while keeping some tuna flakes intact.
  5. Cover and refrigerate until needed. For a sandwich, add the filling shortly before eating where practical; for a lunch plate, spoon it into a small mound so any extra moisture is easy to notice.

Use the celery as part of the structure

Celery cut into big crescent shapes can pull out of a sandwich in one bite. A fine dice spreads its crunch through the softer tuna, and it needs no extra preparation beyond washing, trimming and chopping. The parsley gives a fresh edge without competing with the lemon.

If your drained tuna is already very soft, fold with a spoon rather than repeatedly raking with a fork. The aim is to coat the flakes, not to make the texture uniform. A little variation gives the filling something more interesting than mayonnaise alone.

Try pickle egg salad for a different sandwich filling, or make a caper-heavy pickle sauce to serve separately with cooked fish.

Chopped flat-leaf parsley beside a kitchen knife on a board.
Dry the parsley before chopping the leaves and tender stems.

Make it close to the meal

Use within three refrigerated days of opening the tuna. Keep the packed lunch chilled.

Keep the jar open

Browse all recipes
Diced beetroot, apple and pickles with fresh dill.

Salads

Beetroot and pickle salad with apple and dill

Cooked beetroot, sharp dill pickles and crisp apple in a simple mustard dressing, without turning everything into a mayonnaise salad.

Make this recipe
Toasted buckwheat salad with diced pickles, red pepper, spring onion and parsley.

Salads

Buckwheat and pickle salad

Toasted buckwheat groats with diced pickles, red pepper and a mustard dressing, made to keep the grains separate.

Make this recipe
Whole chickpeas, red pepper and pickles in a lemon dressing.

Salads

Chickpea and pickle salad with a lemon dressing

A substantial cold salad of chickpeas, diced pickles, red pepper and parsley with a simple mustard lemon dressing.

Make this recipe
More from Eat it.All stories